Is The Secrets of Dumbledore that fantastic?
The spin-off series of the world-famous book series Harry Potter, The Fantastic Beasts is back with the secrets of the ever-loved headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore. The movie is quite exciting and riveting. And it looks like the writers, J K Rowling, and Steve Kloves, have listened to the criticism the last movie gained due to its essay-like narration.
This movie gives us glimpses of Dumbledore and Grindelwald’s relationship we were waiting to see after J K Rowling revealed that Albus Dumbledore was gay and had a romantic affair with Grindelwald. The only thing interesting that showed how inextricably bound they were once was the blood pact pendent which prevented each other from fighting. And personally, I don’t think they did the best for the couple.
Well, let me remind you what happened between the two to renew your memory,
Albus Dumbledore and Gellert Grindelwald were both ingenious wizards with somewhat extreme ambitions. They were searching for the Deathly Hallows together to lead a revolution that would connect the wizarding world to the human world. But their relationship experienced a shift that would turn them from lovers to enemies, and their duel ended up killing Dumbledore’s diseased sister. After that, Grindelwald Disappeared.
And now we are here in the third movie of the series with the main plot about an election in the wizarding world. And Grindelwald is striving to become the ministry of magic to full fill his good old strategy.
The plot was quite a mess with all the subplots, and oh boy, there were two candidates for the election that came out of nowhere. And none of the three candidate’s visions/intentions were made clear throughout the movie!
There were quite a few fantastic beasts in the movie, and the main one was a Qilin. Actually, there are two twin Qilins. The whole story is bound to these two Qilins, and they add some feeling and color to the primarily grey scenes throughout the movie. Qilins are dear-like creatures who could investigate a person’s soul and find out if they have a pure heart. They bow to people who are pure of nature, which is why a Qilin is used in the election to find the next minister of magic.
The wyvern was also a terrific addition to the list of magical beasts in the wizarding world. I loved the rescue scene it was involved in as well.
And one more great thing about the movie was Jacob Kowalski’s character development. Jacob starts as a man who had shunned the wizarding world after what happened in the last film when he got heartbroken. When he talks to Eulalie, he says he’s like the pan he’s holding. He’s “dented and beaten” up. And then, he ended up bringing the pan on the train, and while onboard, he replaced this pan which represents his broken muggle life, with a magical wand taking his first step of healing and finally accepting the wizarding world back into his life. He gains a ton of confidence, symbolized by the statue of a man falling from a cake at the begging of the movie and the figure of the man standing on the cake elegantly at the end of the film.
And sadly, Newt Scamander only makes very few appearances in the movie even though he is the main character of the series. But I think even though the scenes are a few, he makes some remarkable moves and shows some character development and maturity than in the last two movies. For example, his relationship with his brother Theseus shows a vast improvement. And I love how both sets of brothers, Newt and Theseus and Dumbledore and Aberforth, starts off being bitter toward each other, and by the end of the movie, they are both on better terms.
Finally, let’s not forget what WB did to Jonny Depp. Mads Mikkelsen did a great job as Grindelwald, but it’s not his fault that Jonny Depp is irreplaceable. Even though this movie is a little dull, I think what we have to understand is that the Harry Potter series was from the eyes of a child growing up, and the Fantastic Beasts series comes from a way more mature perspective. It is a little deep, dull, and yet magical.
